Heartworm Positive?
Seeing Through Pharma Propaganda
Research: Fasting is Powerful!
You’re FIRED, Doc!
Tasty Tip: Shots DUE?
Along the Natural Path
Your Dog Tested HW Positive? Read This.
In case you ever get a positive heartworm test, this might be a cautionary tale.
It reminds me just how crude the current (conventional medical) treatment for heartworm is.
Some time ago, a DVM cardiologist published a piece called “Top 5 Complications During & After Heartworm Treatment”
If you didn’t already have enough fear of this parasite, this article might propel you into doing the monthly drugs (read: neurotoxic pesticides) year round as “prevention.”
That’s if you didn’t know there was a safe and very effective drug free approach.
Let’s see how conventional medicine treats the parasite when it’s established in your dog’s heart.
And the crazy consequences of their slash and burn approach.
First, the drug used to kill the adult worms is still, after many decades, an arsenic compound. The latest version, probably 25 years in use now, is called melarsomine.
This poison has to be injected deep in the muscles, as it’s painful. And it’s given 2-3 times, often after a month’s worth of tetracycline.
As it kills rather rapidly, here’s the complications list, compliments of the cardiologist:
Emboli: pieces of dead worms break off and can lodge in blood vessels, including those of the heart and lungs. This side effect can be life threatening and symptoms include coughing blood, difficult breathing, appetite loss and fever. Your dog may require steroids, oxygen, and strict cage rest. [You’ve probably heard of “exercise restriction” in this treatment? Months worth, to (hopefully) prevent this nasty side effect of sudden worm death. No walks, no romps, just leashed trips to the yard for potty breaks. You’ve got an active dog? Good luck!]
Sudden death of larvae. These microscope youngsters can also die rapidly, with consequences ranging from lethargy, drooling and nausea to rapid heart beat, rapid breathing, low blood pressure and, well, “collapse.” Out come the steroids, IV fluids, and hospitalization again.
Whoops: we didn’t kill all the worms! Latest recommendation to prevent this familiar scenario: use a 3-dose regimen of poisonous arsenic. It’s a better killer than two doses. Of course it costs you more and involves much longer exercise restriction.
Injection Site Reactions As you might imagine, arsenic is not exactly friendly to bodily tissues. In addition to pain, swelling, and reluctance to move, your dog may show “Hypersalivation, panting, vomiting, diarrhea, anorexia, and weakness … following injection.” But hey, we can give pain killers! And sedatives!
Caval Syndrome Don’t ask. Heart failure from too many worms maturing all at once. Not sure what this has to do with treatment consequences, but suffice it to say, if your dog is reasonably healthy, her immune system will prevent this disaster.
But, My Dog Has HW! Now what?
I get emails like this periodically. Usually from owners whose dogs have no symptoms of illness, just a positive test. And man, are they scared!
First and foremost: Don’t Panic!
Parasites rarely kill anyone suddenly and unexpectedly.
(Read that 2-3 times and breath deeply. It’s true. Time is on your side, 90% of the time.)
It turns out homeopathy can cure these dogs very well. When I was in full time homeopathic practice, I cured probably 14 of 15 cases (the uncured one just died of old age, not the HW).
But like most of homeopathy, it’s never a “heartworm treatment,” but rather a treating of the sick patient based on how he’s showing his sickness.
Hence, there’s not a “homeopathic protocol” for this disease, but a qualified homeopathic vet can treat your dog, get him healthy, and, lo and behold, the worms no longer have a sick body to call home.
Do they die off suddenly, with all the complications the arsenic brings?
Nope.
They die in due course (usually within 6 months, in my experience) as your dog’s body recognizes the parasite as not belonging and attacks it in its own intelligent way.
Mom Nature knows better than Dr. WhiteCoat how to rid free loading parasites!
Dogs under this kind of treatment, the homeopathic constitutional kind of treatment, need zero exercise restriction.
If you’ve received this diagnosis, take your time and search out a qualified homeopathic vet. I have a link to a video I made detailing the weeding out process on my Recommended Resources page for you.
No rush, especially if your dog isn’t coughing and intolerant of exercise.
There’s also an herbal approach but I can only say it’s a “kill the worm” approach vs what I’m describing, the “Get-your-dog-so-damned-healthy, the-worms-leave” approach.
But it is a “one size fits all” and probably easier than working with a homeopathic vet. Search it out online if you wish, but buyer beware. I’d want to talk to several people who had success with it before purchasing.
Complications?
Meh, who has time (and $$$) to deal with complications?
Get Nature employed and stand back in awe of what she’s capable of.
HW “Prevention” Propaganda
April was “Heartworm Prevention Month,” brought to you by Big (Vet) Pharma and friends.
But much like vaccine hesitancy, bolstered greatly by the world wide ruse called COVID-19, pet owners are looking more askance at heartworm prevention.
And, much like the vaccine pushers, the HW drug industry uses propaganda to sell their pesticides.
Texas A&M recently put out some wildly illogical arguments for giving these potent poisons for 12 months of the year.
First, Reality
How much of this scary disease is out there?
This is from Cornell’s Baker Institute:
Approximately 1.5% of dogs in the U.S. are infected with heartworms, although prevalence varies by region.”
Okay, so no where near a runaway epidemic, right?
Then, how does it transmit?
As you likely know, it takes mosquitoes to spread this parasite from the infested dog to your non-parasitized dog.
Mosquitoes. The summertime bugaboo we know all too well.
They have to suck up a blood meal from the HW infested dog, meaning adult worms are present in or around that dog’s heart.
Those adult worms shed microscopic larvae, and if those larvae are in that blood meal the mosquito sucks in, and the temperature is right (above 57º F for two solid weeks), those larvae can become infective to your dog.
Sounds like winter would be a HW drug vacation time, right?
Texas A&M University, along with the American HW Society aren’t buying it, even though parasitologists have studied this in depth.
Let’s Try to Sway the Dog Owning Public…
But see if you can read through this wild “logic” in TAMU’s latest missive, with a title you gotta love: “Not every worm follows the rules”
Its author, Catherine Campbell, DVM, veterinary diagnostician at TAMU’s College Station lab, would like you to know:
Heartworm disease is serious issue (sic)… Heartworm testing is important, and there are wonderful preventatives out there that provide great protection.”
Wonderful? I’ve yet to meet such a pesticide or neurotoxin.
And she’d like you to be suitably scared by a big number:
Currently, more than 100,000 dogs in the U.S. test positive for heartworms each year.”
But, with a bit of digging, you’ll learn the AVMA estimates from 2024 that there are 76,811,305 dogs in the US.
So, lessee, that means (tap tap) 1.3% of dogs test positive for this disease.
Puts that big number down a few notches on the fear scale, right?
Here’s TAMU doc’s premise for year round HW pesticide use. And I swear, I’m not making this up.
First, she’d like you to know this is a “misconception:”
“It’s winter — dogs don’t need heartworm preventive.”
Kind of a gentler, less provoking way to say “misinformation,” which might be more of a trigger word since what we just lived through, where that label was slung against anyone daring to knock the narrative that COVID-19 was a deadly pandemic with only ONE HOPE to beat.
But, let the fun begin… tell us why this is misinformation a misconception, doc.
Point #1: “It’s been detected in non-native dogs in Alaska…There are mosquitoes up there too.”
Uh huh, right.
So, the native dogs don’t carry it, but we’ve seen some dogs visiting from, say, Florida or Louisiana that were POSITIVE for HW.
And?
Would you like us to infer from that that HW is a serious risk in AK?? Or anywhere with, you know, winter?
Let’s look at an incidence map, shall we?
Here’s a colorful one from 2023, from the Companion Animal Parasite Council (CAPC).
While it doesn’t show Alaska, let’s assume, based on climate, that it would have even LESS HW than those upper states in pale blue, like Michigan, Montana, Oregon, and Washington (with a projected whopping 1/2 a percent to 1 percent of positive dogs)
Sorry, TAMU, that’s not a logical reason to give pesticides year round.
[And hol’ up: that map’s red zone projection? A range of 4% to <cough> 100%?? That’s wild enough to make you question the entire map, isn’t it?]
And who sponsors the CAPC? Can you guess?
Point #2: “The travel or relocation of heartworm-positive dogs from high-risk areas is a concern, as it can introduce the parasite into regions where heartworm is not commonly found.”
Okay, so dogs with heartworm can move around. We buy that. People move, take their dogs to their new locale.
But, aren’t you leaving out, you know, winter?
That Florida dog, say, carrying HW larvae, moves to Montana and gets a mosquito bite in, say late summer, how likely are those larvae to develop to infective stages to give your dog heartworm? The little flying menaces only live for 30 days…
So, it’s infectivity development we’ll concern ourselves with, and giving a pesticide year round is a bit like putting sunscreen on at night.
To mix metaphors, that horse ain’t racing.
The Icing on the Fear Cake
This other bit of misinformation er, misconception, is akin to the indoor cat needing a rabies shot, because, you know? Bats could fly down the chimney…
“Indoor pets do not need heartworm prevention.”
Your logic please, Doc?
“Mosquitoes can come indoors,” Campbell said. “It only takes one bite.”
Oh, please.
It only takes one bite, but:
from a mosquito who’s carrying an infective load
with all the conditions just right (temperature, life expectancy, presence of infested dogs to bite first),
an alert owner not seeing and swatting the intruder before it reaches Sadie
and Sadie being unhealthy enough to allow unbridled development of those larvae to adulthood…
What are the odds, realistically, for Sadie, the mini moosh moosh, who pees on pee pads and lives indoors in Wisconsin…?
It doesn’t take a mathematician to see through illogic like this.
It does take some common sense, which, I’ll admit, seems to be getting less common as the years pass by.
So, read carefully when the degreed “experts” are trying to sell you on something.
Discernment is your friend, and you need never be put on the spot. Time is also on your side:
“Thanks, Dr. WhiteCoat, we’ll research this a bit more and get back to you if we decide to take your advice.”
Research: Fasting is Powerful!
Researchers have just proved (in humans) what so many have known for a long time.
Intermittent fasting, in this case, no food from 5 pm to 9 am, had positive effects on blood sugar stabilization and fat loss.
The Spanish subjects would normally begin eating at 7-8 am and didn’t finish until 8-10 pm (which sounds quite similar to the Indian model all around me).
The test group adhered to the diet well.
Every Dog and Cat Should Do This
Besides you benefiting from this strategy (choose your hours of eating; I eat 8:30 am to 2:30 pm most days), your pet will clearly also benefit.
Easy avoidance of obesity and, though you’d never measure it routinely, Sadie’s blood sugar will be more stable.
And if Sadie or Tigger are already overweight, this simple measure will help them lose weight, without resorting to expensive “prescription” diets (over processed, byproduct laden, and toxic).
In people, we know this practice translates to less cardiovascular disease, less chance of diabetes, and normalization of weight.
You can see some amazing before/after pics on Reddit if you search for the Intermittent Fasting thread.
One meal a day for all but the teeniest dogs is the simplest way to effect the intermittent fasting routine.
The Wild Model
And, recalling that every dog’s ancestors are wolves (yep: even your Cockapoo or Chihuahua), doesn’t this make perfect sense?
No way are the wild ancestors eating all day long, right?
Totally dependent on hunger…
driving the hunt (lots of exercise in that activity!),
bringing down the prey (social skills!) and
gorging (don’t ever worry about your dog “wolfing” his food, as long as it’s raw).
And that’s followed by rest. Until the hunger returns enough to drive the next hunt.
No wolf ever turns his nose up at prey, by the way.
So, I’ll put money on your fussy dog or cat stopping that food rejection when you allow hunger to return regularly with intermittent feeding.
Research usually lags behind real world discovery. But it’s always nice when it corroborates our collective experience.
Standing Against Insanity
Just wanted to share that after over 20 years of providing holistic care for my animals, I had my first experience of a vet requiring my 15 yo dog to have a rabies shot before they would see him. I walked out!
The more I think about it, the madder I get! I guess I need to be grateful this was my first time. They used the line, it’s only good for 3 years, I said it’s actually 7 years and probably more for my little dog. 😂” —Marti Miller, Colorado
Marti, a long time reader of my stuff and holistic champion for her pets, saw this vet fallacy for what it was: ignorance.
As if immunity is like a gas tank.
It gets used up over time, and the label says “repeat every three years,” so science, right?
Umm, no, that’s Big Pharma-ese for
“We don’t pay attention to no steenking immunology! We tested this lot of vaccines for 3 years and need to start selling it!”
A 15 year old’s need for more vaccines is realistically nil. As I point out here:
If you’re smarter than your vet on this, and he tries to hold you hostage to such insanity, you can follow Marti’s lead.
Bonus points if you tell him why you’re not doing business with him any longer (pointers in the article above…).
Tasty Tip: DUE?
Poor woman.
The rabies vaccine buffer (aka tautode) was on its way, but it just wasn’t arriving fast enough (it seemed) to beat the impending (and dreaded) rabies vaccination date on the calendar.
Hand wringing ensued.
Multiple emails to our support line.
Could it be lost?
Is there a tracking number?
My support staff didn’t know any better than the poor worried woman what the Really Best Answer was:
Cancel (or reschedule) that appointment!
Q: What’s so important about a vaccination date that it can’t be pushed off into the future by a month or two?
A: Absolutely nothing!
And who knows? By then, you might be wiser about the need for (another) vaccine and decide you really don’t even need it.
Due? Says WHO?
You know that a vaccine that’s “due” is really due in the eyes of the beholder, right?
Two beholders I can think of immediately have very different takes on what “due” means:
The vet who wants to give it. Cha ching! That’s especially true of annual vaccinations, a sure sign that you’re seeing a vet who should be fired!
An immunologist, a thinking, reasoning vet, or you, once you’ve learned something about DOI (duration of immunity)!
The reality.
If you’ve got an already vaccinated pet, odds are her immunity is longggg lasting. Years or perhaps a lifetime, vet immunologists have written.
The non-reality:
Immunity is like a gas tank that needs refilling. See the above piece, Standing Against Insanity.
Anyone conveying that idea just hasn’t tuned into what immunology has long recognized, or is conveniently ignoring science in favor of a fast buck.
What Immunologists Know
In a nutshell, it’s this:
Whether your animal (or you) are exposed to an actual disease (Lyme, parvo, flu) or is vaccinated against it, it’s the response of her immune system that’s the key.
Did she respond? A titer a few weeks later would tell you, but odds are good she did.
If so, boom. You’re done.
Immunity is a wonderful thing.
It lasts and lasts.
But, but… that appointment!
Have an appointment you’re worried about for a repeat vaccination?
Probably best to read this free series on vaccination.
Feeling like there’s no time to read this stuff so you’re making wiser decisions for your innocents?
Here’s a FREE month extension for you: call up the vet and postpone it by 30 days!
You can be done reading the articles and a whole lot wiser in much less than a month.
And then?
Well, you might just cancel that appointment.
And maybe even fire your vet, especially if he’s telling you yearly that Peaches is due.
And if you’d like to listen to these concepts, take me along in your earbuds in this episode of my Vital Animal Podcast on your next dog walk:
Along the Natural Path
After a good ten days of on and off rain, we got a morning glimpse of Himalayan snowcaps, always a treat. If you glance only carelessly, you might think it’s all clouds, but then you see the sharp edges that would give climbers breathless delight.
The views on my morning hikes are never dull, as I imagine what living on terraced slopes might be like.
Along the way, I meet lots of dogs, a handful of which I’ve made friends with, like this girl, taking her morning nap:
There’s a fair amount of territoriality spoken between packs that happen to meet on the road I walk. When I was positioned between two making a big ballyhoo, I (think) I talked them down.
“Hey, ease up. You guys all know each other…”
Yesterday morning, and the one before, I was lucky enough to spot a langur, the tree top gentle leaf eating giants, known for their 6 foot tails and shyness.
When he makes a move, you hear his presence, as his 80 lb body hurls from branch to branch. Still hoping to repeat a sighting of a troupe on the move, as I saw a couple years back. Mesmerizing.
From the great and mighty Himalaya to the tiniest mini fern “forest” that shows itself after a good rain…
… there’s enough to keep my inner biologist suitably appreciative of where I am on this amazing planet.
We’re on a bit of high alert here, as yesterday, a little girl, innocently walking up our driveway, was accosted by a macaque, who bit her leg. Unprovoked aggression like that brings suspicion of rabies, and our resident doctor treated her wound and started a series of three post-exposure prophylaxis injections of rabies anti-serum.
I’ve asked my homeopathic cohort in one of our charitable hospitals to send me some Lyssin 200C, the nosode made from rabid saliva, just in case I become a bite victim. I won’t take it preventatively, as I’m under constitutional homeopathic treatment now, but I’d interrupt that in a heartbeat if I were similarly bitten.
Can you use that remedy in place of a rabies vaccine?
In short, no, that’s not practical, but I’m working on a longer piece to explain the logic behind that. Stay tuned.
Time to wrap up for now, and I hope you found some value in today’s newsletter. As always, keep on making wise decisions for those innocents in your care who will take what ever you offer or allow.
Until next time, leave your thoughts below and I’ll see you in a couple weeks.
Will Falconer, DVM
I agree 100% with what you've written - and the manner in which you wrote it: Common sense truth!
Dr Falconer educated me about shots over 20 years ago in relation to my dogs and I’m so grateful. But considering this article, I’m going to be bold and say that there’s no necessity to give a shot even “once and done”. Just being out and about in nature, around people and other dogs, exposes your dog to everything he needs to build his immunities to his surrounds. What’s in those vials is vile matter. And that’s not going to into my dogs or me.